fact, that plainness of diction which in the perusal of Cowper has given such offence to the fastidious, has been the result of mature judgment, for that the poet knew how to impart the most exquisite polish to his lincs is evident from the specimens quoted by Mr. Hayley of his version of the Latin and Italian poetry of Milton, than which nothing can be more musical and finished. Of the Italian poets we possess also some good translations; the Ariosto of Hoole I think much superior to his Tasso, and the Inferno of that wonderful genius Dante is well laid open to the curiosity of the public by Mr. Boyd; but no poet perhaps has ever been so greatly indebted to a Translator as Camöens, whose Lusiad in the very elegant and spirited version of Mr. Mickle, has perfectly the air of an English original; its defects are concealed or mitigated, while its beauties catch double lustre from the British dress. A taste for Arabic and Persian poetry has been acquired through the labours of the Asiatic Society, In this their primal poet, observes the Author of The Pursuits of Literature, there is an originality and a hardihood of antiquity. His soul was dark and sullen; it was proud and full of his wrongs. Frons læta parum et dejecto lumina vulta. He passed through imaginary realms without the sun, to the confines of light and hope. The day shone full upon him, and the beams were from on high. His draught of men and their passions is eternal. His language was like himself, deep and full of matter: its strength and harmony may be best expressed by his Tuscan brother •* Aspro concento, orribile armonia D'alte querele, d'ululi, e di strida, Instranamente concordar s'udia. Ariosto O. F. cant. 16. * Pursuits of Literature, Introductory Letter p. 26. and Sir William Jonest has particularly distinguished himself by several incomparable translations of, and acute criticisms on the poets of the east. For many elegant Arabian poems also we are highly indebted to Professor Carlyle; unacquainted with the originals I am incompetent to judge of their fidelity, but as beautiful and exquisitely finished pieces they are entitled to warm commendation. Upon comparing the arrangement we have thus given. of the chief poets in the two periods, and of their principal productions, it must strike every reader that Mr. Headley has been greatly too partial to his phalanx of ancients. Let us for a moment reflect what various and exquisite poems only the last forty-five years have produced, and we shall be utterly at a loss to conceive how any author could assert that the "Key that oped the sacred source of sympathetic tears, seems now and has done for a century past irrecoverably lost." It is + The death of this great man is an irreparable loss to christianity, to science and to literature, He-whom Indus and the Ganges mourn, The glory of their banks, from Isis torn, In learning's strength is fled, in judgment's prime, In science temp'rate, various and sublime; To him familiar every legal doom, The courts of Athens, or the halls of Rome, His mind collected, at opinion's shock JONES stood unmov'd, and from the Christian rock, Calestial brightness beaming on his breast, He saw THE STAR, and worshipp'd in the East. Pursuits of Literature, p. 422. evident, I think, from the survey just taken, that never was there an age more distinguished than the present for poetic excellence in almost every department of the art, nor can the sternest critic who shall impartially compare the two tables, and recollect that the latter embraces only half the space of time allotted to the former, avoid acknowledging the great merit and lustre of his contemporaries. If in the Drama we confess the superiority of Shakspeare, in the epic field, having an Ossian or rather a Macpherson to produce, we are nearly upon a level, and in every other province a marked and decisive pre-eminence must be granted to the poets of the present reign. In the Lyric, Descriptive, and Didactic columns there can be no competition, nor can any, I should imagine be hinted at in those appropriated to Satire, Miscellaneous Poets and Translators. In thus combating the opinions of those who have been solicitous to depreciate our present poety, I have selected the text of Mr. Headley as conveying the sentiments of the whole body, and more especially as his general good taste might probably for a time even impart weight and consequence to a critical error. Of the Editor of the Select Beauties of Ancient English Poetry as a Scholar, a Critic and a Man, I entertain a very high opinion; he was beloved by his friends, I understand, with an enthusiasm which his amiable qualities fully justified, and I have only to lament that his prejudices in favour of our elder poetry should so far have vitiated his judgment as to preclude any fair estimate of the value of modern genius. Offspring of other times, ye visions old! THE popular superstitions of every country afford not only amusement to the credulous and inquisitive, but furnish subjects of curious speculation to the philosopher and historian. The genius and manners of a people, their progress in civilization, and even the very character of the country and climate they exist in, may, in a great measure, be ascertained from the nature of their mythological creed. In the early stages of society, where no extensive or complicated union has taken place for mutual defence and protection, man is exposed to perpetual and numerous dangers; in a state of almost continual warfare with the tribes around him, or employed in the severe and almost equally dangerous toils of the chace for his daily subsistence, he is altogether indebted for life and safety to his own individual exertions; hunger and revenge call aloud for gratification, and occupy every intellectual effort of the Being thus situated, every direction of his muscular strength. Obnoxious to various perils, at one time almost perishing for want of food, at another putting in practice every wily stratagem to entrap a foe or protect himself; ignorant of the causes and effects of all the mighty phenomena of nature which surround him, and conscious from dire experience of his own frequent inefficiency to gratify his appetites, or satiate his resentments, the savage naturally looks for assistance beyond the pale of mortality. Unacquainted however with any rational system of religion, he calls into being, and gives local habitation and a name to, the wanderings of a terrified imagination; the thunder, the lightning, and the whirlwind, the roaring of the mountain torrent, the sighing of the gathering storm, the illusive meteors of night, and the fleeting forms of clouds and mist, are with him the appalling tones and awful visitations of supernatural beings. He hears the spirit of the whirlwind or the water shriek, and either implores the assistance, or deprecates the wrath of agents whose powers are gigantic, and whose modes of operation are illimitable and unseen. Should he inhabit a country peculiarly rude and gloomy in its aspect, where the almost boundless heath, the stupendous mountain, or the darkening forest form the prominent features of the landscape, where silence and solitude, unbroken but by the harsh screaming of the bird of prey, or the tumults of the rushing tempest, brood over the scene in solemn majesty, his superstitious fears partake of the wild and melancholy sublimity which the objects before him are calculated to inspire, and breathe a much severer spirit than the |